


Welcome to My Dark Side

by IntotheStarkerVerse (IntotheStarkerverse), StarkerVerse (IntotheStarkerverse)



Series: Life and Times [2]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, BAMF Peter Parker, Endgame compliant, M/M, Not Far From Home Compliant, Pain, Sassy Tony Stark, Sequel, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Young Tony Stark, but also some whump and fluff, good characters gone bad, more tags to come
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-09
Updated: 2020-04-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:09:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22182331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IntotheStarkerverse/pseuds/IntotheStarkerVerse, https://archiveofourown.org/users/IntotheStarkerverse/pseuds/StarkerVerse
Summary: Sequel to 'Time of Our Lives.'Tony Stark has done his best to fit into the 21st century by embracing his new role, new family, and even his new nicknames.  Determined to become a hero worthy of calling Peter Parker his life partner, everything seems to be going better than he could have hoped…until Tony’s efforts to help Peter uncover the truth behind his parents’ death put everything he knows and loves in terrible danger.  In the face of absolute darkness, how can love and life survive?
Relationships: Peter Parker/Tony Stark
Series: Life and Times [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1596775
Comments: 60
Kudos: 187





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> At long last, the time has come to begin bringing you my sequel to 'Time of Our Lives.' I am blown away by the love and support that fic has garnered in its time online. If I have not yet replied to your comments there, rest assured that I will be doing so shortly. I hope that this fic can live up to everyone's expectations (especially since I have ideas for at least two more in this series assuming all goes well...) Thank you in advance to everyone who sees fit to leave Kudos and Comments. I love you guys. No one could ask for a better group of muses...

Eyes that once held love were empty now. There was nothing there beyond his own reflection in their familiar hues. He could do nothing but stare into those eyes, feeling as if he was drowning in the absence of emotion, in the loss that reverberated through every piece of his soul.

He wanted to cry out, to scream, to plead, to curse, but no words would come.

He wanted to cling to the one in front of him, grab fist-fulls of shirt in his hands and drag him closer. He wanted to wrap his hands around that throat and squeeze the life from that alabaster flesh to somehow quench the fury scorching through his very soul.

He could do none of this, though.

He could only stand, motionless, staring at the figure in front of him, powerless to do anything. 

Perhaps it was a blessing. 

As long as he was forced to stare at the one in front of him, he couldn’t be made to look at the lifeless body that lay beyond them and once more face the implications of it.

Everything. 

He’d lost everything.

Tony didn’t know how, he didn’t know when, but he wasn’t going to let that death go unavenged.

Peter Parker had to die for what he’d done, and Tony would be the one to kill him...gladly.

~ ~ ~

Much Earlier…

~ ~ ~

“How long do you think we can hide here before someone realizes we’re missing?” Peter’s lips against his ear made the billionaire shiver. Thinking about all of the things he’d rather have Peter doing with those lips…that was doing other things to entirely different areas of his body. 

“Oh, I don’t know, Beautiful, depends on if anyone saw us disappear into our hiding place or not.” He certainly hoped that no one had witnessed their escape. If Tony had his way, he’d have Peter all to himself for the rest of the evening.

“May was busy with Happy…”

“And Pepper was talking to some old guy from the Board. Long as the OG Avengers weren’t paying us any mind, I think we’re safe.” 

“Good.” Peter snuggled in closer to him and Tony was only too happy to wrap an arm around the younger man. Cuddled together in the muted darkness with the only light that which was filtering through the white silk all around them, they were both eager to forget the world they’d left behind in favor of the one they’d created for themselves. Maybe it was irresponsible. It was a fundraiser for May’s charity for the ‘Blip’ displaced, sponsored by Stark Industries because Tony would do anything to make Peter smile…and also to make May like him better than she’d liked the Old Man. But there was really only so much a guy could kiss ass and sip champagne and make eyes at Peter in his tux before it all became unbearable. Not that their new activity was any better, really. It wasn’t what he wanted to be doing, but Tony could make the best of a dull situation. 

So, the seat was far from comfortable. Hard really. Cold too. The body next to him was warm and pretty and smelled like that inexpensive drug store cologne that Peter always wore…the one that Tony had gone to a big box store to find and purchase just so he could spray it on his sheets and pretend he still had Peter on the bed next to him. Worst part about the future, for sure, that Peter was still living at home with his aunt and wasn’t able to share Tony’s bed like he had for six months in 1992. It was hard to get used to sleeping without him. Tony hadn’t had any idea just how much Peter had weaseled his way into his mind, body, and soul, until he was laying in an empty bed acutely aware of the boy’s absence from his arms.

Tony shifted his grip on the phone in his free hand, making the projected holographic image of ‘Reno 911’ jump slightly. Peter whimpered and Tony could only laugh. He wouldn’t have heard the small sound of dismay at all if they weren’t forced to share a pair of wireless earbuds. One for each of them. It seemed that only Tony had come prepared to entertain himself during the fundraiser…though, he could never disappear to enjoy binge-watching the decades of movies and television he’d missed out on without Peter at his side. Next time, he’d remember to bring two full sets of earbuds so they could both enjoy stereo quality sound.

The soft ambient light of the ballroom was obscured by a looming, dark shadow. A moment later, the white silk in front of them shifted to reveal a very annoyed strawberry blonde kneeling on the floor in an expensive designer gown and scowling at them in a way that was sure to cause frown lines. “Are you two seriously hiding under a banquet table watching Netflix?”

Tony cocked an eyebrow, looking from Pepper to their surroundings and back again. They had, indeed, both crawled under a banquet table to watch television in lieu of mingling with guests that were old and boring. “I mean…as much as I want to come up with a better explanation for what we’re doing, I got nothing. Peter?”

Peter shrugged with a stifled giggle. “Sorry, Tony, if you can’t think of anything…we’re doomed.”

“You’re worse than Morgan. Both of you.” Pepper looked to be at the end of her patience, though Tony was completely unperturbed.

“Now that you mention it, Pep, I notice you didn’t make Morgan come to this…”

“She’s six.”

“And I have the emotional maturity of a six-year-old according to a lot of therapists..” Tony pointed this out with a broad grin and a quick glance at his boyfriend.

“That’s true, he does.” And Peter would know.

“Peter…don’t help him. I really expect better from you. You’re supposed to be a good influence on TJ, he is not supposed to be a bad influence on you.”

“Hey,” Tony’s smile was gone, as was his good humor. “Peter is a good influence. I wanted to sneak off into an empty office and re-enact some dirty movies. Peter convinced me to keep it PG and stay close to home in case we were missed. You can snipe at me all you want, Ms. Potts, but don’t even think about dragging Peter down because you’re pissed at me. Not gonna fly. He’s a literal angel...”

Peter let out a melodramatic sigh, “Tony, it’s really okay…”

“It’s not. It’s really not. Pepper owes you an apology.”

“Tony…” 

“Well…” He cocked his head at the older woman, unafraid to meet her gaze without flinching. He didn’t care if the Old Man had married her, or if as far as Pepper was concerned…she was his stepmother. He was a twenty-one year old man, and he’d had a perfectly good mother of his own. Pepper’s eyes narrowed slightly, but he was confident that she saw something in his gaze that made her reconsider her current tactic, because she turned her gaze to Peter. 

“I’m sorry, Peter. TJ is right, I’m sure if you weren’t here he would have done something worthy of a Stark that would have required a press conference tomorrow to explain the TMZ video. Now, I’d really appreciate it if you could convince him to be responsible and come out of here for the remainder of the fundraiser though. He’s not going to do it for me…but he will for you.”

Peter was blushing when Tony cast a sidelong glance in his direction. “No, Peter…” He could not be falling for it, could he?

“C’mon, she’s right.”

Fuck. He was.

“It’s May’s fundraiser. We shouldn’t be down here.” Ugh. He loved his beautiful, goody-two shoes boyfriend, but there were times Tony really wished Peter would get in touch with his inner dark side.

“You win this round, Pep.” Tony was already thumbing the holographic screen off and sliding his earbuds back into his tuxedo jacket pocket. Just as he was bracing to crawl from beneath the table and rejoin the party, if that’s really what they wanted to call it, (Tony thought party was severely mislabeling it), when he felt the watch on his wrist begin buzzing frantically.

Their newest AI had been named in honor of a fallen Avenger; the Newly Analogued Technological Avengers’ Sentinel Hazard Alarm or N.A.T.A.S.H.A. was proving to be a very valuable asset, too. The AI monitored CCTV footage, news media, social media, and cell phone chatter to locate and categorize threats that required Avenger intervention and then immediately contacted the closest Avengers when any such threat was discovered. So far, she’d done her job with only a few minor hiccups. The buzzing coming from both Tony and then Peter’s smartwatches meant they were among the closest Avengers to something that could prove to be very dangerous.

Pepper let out an annoyed groan. “Of course. Of course this would happen now.”

“Nothing we can do, Pep, duty calls.” If Tony looked a little too smug, well, there was nothing he could do about that really.

“And what am I supposed to tell people Peter is doing while Iron Lad and Spider-Man are off saving the city?” From Pepper’s expression, Tony knew she thought she’d stumped him...but honestly, she should know better. 

Tony could not hide his self-satisfied smirk as he typed something into his watch. “Peter’s going to be in the conference room watching his boyfriend save New York. He’ll pace. He’ll worry. He’ll even react to the fight in ways that Friday deems to be appropriate. Just make sure that no one but you, Happy, or May goes in to ‘check’ on him…that way, no one will know he’s just a bit of BARF re-purposed to save my boyfriend’s secret identity.”

“He thinks of everything.” And the pride in Peter’s voice at that bit of praise was somehow Tony Stark’s only reason for living in that particular moment. God, he could die happy with that being the last thing to ever grace his ears. Not that he didn’t have a hell of a lot to live for…

~ ~ ~

What. The. Actual. Fuck.

“You know, Spidey, when you told me all those stories about you and Iron Man saving the world from threats both alien and domestic....I somehow did not imagine that I would one day join you and find myself facing a man who calls himself ‘Unicorn.’” Despite the gravity of the fight in which the New Avengers currently found themselves embroiled, the crimson and golden figure of Iron Man could be seen (though not heard) by anxious bystanders canting his head in the direction of an otherwise engaged arachnid crime fighter.

“To be fair, as weird as my bad guys are...this one is weird even for me.” Spider-Man flipped backwards, finding purchase on the side of skyscraper upside down as he avoided the laser beam that slashed dangerously through the air...a laser beam that had originated from the forehead of the villain’s unfortunate green helmet. The beam arced, slashing a clean and gaping line in the mirrored glass facade of the office windows just below Spider-Man causing the young man to edge backwards on fingers and toes as he glanced from his boyfriend to the villain and back again.

Tony really wished that Peter could see him rolling his eyes. “I mean, at least he’s comitted to his concept, I guess. The unicorn on his leotard is a great touch but the orange and green color scheme...”

“As if it is not bad enough that we are fighting a grown man committing crimes as a Unicorn, is it really necessary for you two to make us listen to you flirting the whole damn time, too.” The irritated words were accompanied by the soft whoosh of metallic wings as another hero joined the fray and attracted the Unicorn’s attention only to be rewarded with a concussive force that blasted the hero backwards several feet before he was able to escape the current of the blast and circle back for a return attack.

Tony really, really wished that Sam could see him rolling his eyes. At least he could see the bird that Iron Lad was now flipping in the direction of the newest Captain America. The face of the Iron Man suit was not expressive, but Tony was more than capable of getting his point across with body language.

“Real mature, there are going to be kids watching this, Stark.”

“If you all insist on calling me Iron Lad, I might as well live up to the name. Tell me, Cap, do you have to have a stick up your ass to carry the shield or is being a total prude just a star-spangled side effect?” 

“A little of both, actually.” A new voice echoed across the coms, causing Tony to glance away from Spider-Man as the young man took a gracefully web-anchored leap in the direction of the Unicorn, planted a successful kick, and sent the man careening towards a waiting, very perturbed Captain America.

The Winter Soldier wasn’t hard to spot, and really...Tony had been expecting him. After all, you rarely saw Sam without Bucky. “You know, I really didn’t want to like you, Winny, was all set to hate your guts...but I think next to my sexy Spiderling, you’re definitely my favorite Avenger.”

Bucky’s eyebrows rose but he chose not to comment as the Unicorn used his helmet to erect a force field that blocked Sam’s attack and sent him skidding backwards.

In the end, it wasn’t much of a fight. Once the quartet had goaded the man into showing all of his cards...or at least, in this case, showing them all of the abilities his helmet possessed, it was easy enough for them to coordinate and overpower the man. Of course, their success did not come without a good bit of destruction to several of the neighboring buildings, a few light posts, and a Sky Blue Vespa.

As Sam and Bucky dealt with the responding law enforcement, Tony had taken to the streets with his helmet retracted to address the adoring public.

“Relax guys, I can spare a few minutes to give you some sound bites.” He held up a placating hand and leaned back against one of the badly disfigured lamp posts. This one had been bent in a shape that looked suspiciously like the outline of Cap with wings fully unfurled. It was no accident Tony had chosen that one. “You.” Tony gestured with his head to vaguely familiar blonde he’d seen at a few of the press conferences for SI. If he remembered right, she’d seemed friendly enough with Pepper that he could afford to throw her a bone.

She didn’t waste any time with pleasantries today. “This is the third time in as many weeks that a number of Avengers have responded to an emergency in the city. Does this mean the you’ve ‘re-assembled’ the Avengers and are acting with authority of the government again?”

Tony’s laughter startled several of the other reporters. It was true that up until he’d made his grand entrance in the present that the Avengers had failed to live up to the messianic promise of the Old Man’s death, but he could hardly take complete credit for their new re-unification. Of course, in order for his current plan to work, that was precisely what he was going to have to do....

“Oh yeah, we’re back and better than ever. Turns out all they were missing was a little young blood to give the Avengers some real initiative. Spiderling and I were exactly what the doctor ordered. But it’s cute that you think we need the authority of the government. 

“Look. We tried the whole government oversight thing and it didn’t work. When heroes have to answer to bureaucrats, the universe has a fifty percent survival rate. Push comes to shove, there’s a reason that we’re the heroes and they’re the politicians. When the bad guys can literally dust our loved ones with a snap of their fingers, no one has time to cut their way through a mile of red tape. The Old Man would probably still be alive if the UN had trusted us to do our thing in the first place. So, yeah...no...we’re not officially acting on behalf of the government and we probably won’t ever do that shit again. We’re also not ‘the Avengers’. We’re the New Avengers. Remixed. Improved. We’re younger, smarter, better looking...with a hell of a lot more initiative and righteous fury than the OG crew. They might have slept with one eye open, but we don’t intend to sleep on the job at all.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the red and blue clad figure of his boyfriend facepalming in the shadows. The kid really had to have more faith in him. Tony was doing it all for him anyway. Not that he knew that. Not yet. It would spoil the surprise.

~ ~ ~

“Why aren’t we going back to the party again? It better not be for sex. I mean...I like sex. I love sex. But Ms. Potts and May are going to know that we’re done with the bad guy and one of them is bound to come looking for us in your penthouse...May is already convinced that we’re ‘too serious’ for our age without us dipping out on her party to do it. Tony, she made me promise I wasn’t going to marry you until after I got my college degree. Do you know how embarrassing that conversation was?” It was horrible, Peter had actually preferred the literal sex talk from May to the dinner he’d spent listening to her bemoan the fact that he and TJ seemed to be so wrapped up in each other so young. Never mind that she and Ben had been high school sweethearts...

Tony paused on the helipad of the re-acquired Avengers Tower and cast a weary glance in Peter’s direction. “Wait, you actually promised her we weren’t going to get married until you got your degree? That’s a thing you said? I hope you don’t intend to keep that promise because I don’t know how willing I am to wait four years to get you back in my bed full time...”

Peter felt his heart stall out in his chest. “Wait.” He froze in place, jaw opening and closing several times without making a sound while he floundered for the words. “Does that mean you’re planning to propose...Tony...You want to get married? To me? I mean...okay so sometime in the next four years but still. Wow. Wow. Wow wow wow.” Peter’s expression looked like a mixture of horror and elation. Tony shook his head at the younger man and started walking to the door again, forcing Peter to rush to catch up. “But May...I promised because I didn’t think you’d want to get married for a long time anyway because Mr. Stark was never really big on commitment and you’re still kind of like even if you’re different and...were you going to ask...like soon? Did I spoil a surprise? Just because I promised not to get married doesn’t mean we can’t get engaged...or live together...or both. Preferably both...” His voice trailed off abruptly as he brows drew into a quick, alarmed ‘v’. “Wait!” Peter grabbed for Tony’s arm abruptly before he opened the roof access door. “There’s something wrong...”

“There’s nothing wrong, Beautiful. At least...nothing I didn’t see coming even before your impressive Peter Tingle went off. Relax. We have a guest. He probably thinks he’s surprising us...but I’ve been goading the son of a bitch into a private meeting for the last month. About damn time he took the bait.”

“Who...”

“Come with me, you’ll see.” Tony rested a hand on Peter’s lower back, gently pushing him through the door and towards the elevator to the penthouse. Although he was concerned, Peter trusted his boyfriend implicitly.

The moment the elevator doors opened, it was easy for Peter to ascertain what he’d meant. The comments about ‘initiative’ and the government and the things about ‘one eye’. He was trying to piss of Nick Fury, and apparently he succeeded because the former head of S.H.I.E.L.D. was sitting on Tony’s sofa with a bottle of Scotch sitting on the table in front of him. His feet were kicked up on the coffee table and he looked far too comfortable for an intruder.

“Glad to see you’re making yourself at home, Fury.”

“Since you’re AI watchdog didn’t stop me at the front door, I assumed I was welcome.” He didn’t look up from his tumblr of scotch, instead swishing it around the glass idly before emptying it and reaching out for the bottle to refill it.

“True enough, if I didn’t want you to be here...you wouldn’t be.” Tony guided Peter around the coffee table, gesturing for him to take a seat in a large overstuffed chair while Tony himself perched languidly on the arm. “I won’t insult you by pretending that I don’t know why you’re here.”

“And I won’t pretend that I didn’t know those insults you’ve been letting fly in your little press bites aren’t intentional. If you wanted to talk, you could have just reached out.”

“I don’t like to do things the easy way, Fury. Never have.”

“So I’ve noticed.”

Peter looked back and forth between the two men, one eye narrowed questioningly, lips thinned out in concentration. What was going on here?

“There’s a little something we need to know that only you can help us with. I thought we had a better chance of getting you alone over the New Avengers than the Parkers.”

Peter let out a little gasp of surprise, swiveling in his seat to look at Tony in disbelief. This was about his parents? Tony had gone to all of this trouble for Peter, to help him solve the mystery of what had happened to them. If Peter hadn’t already been head over heals in love with the man, that would have surely done him in.

Fury did not appear to be quite so touched, not if the scowl he was shooting Tony was any indication. “I was afraid of that. Sadly, Stark, you’ve wasted your time. I don’t know now anything about...”

“I call bullshit.” Tony had risen from his seat in one fluid movement, confiscating the bottle of scotch from within Fury’s reach and invading the man’s personal space all at the same time. “I’ve seen the personnel reports, Fury. You recruited Richard Parker. No way you don’t know what happened to a guy you brought into your agency. You’re a prick, but you’re not an irresponsible one.”

Fury let out a long sigh, scrubbing a hand over his face as he sat forward on the couch, his forearms resting on his knees. “The information in classified. Way beyond your clearance.”

“Not gonna fly, Blackbeard. Peter’s got all the security clearance you’ll ever need because he’s their god damn son. And me? I’m the man he loves, the man who will do literally anything to make him happy. I’m not taking no for an answer here and you know it.”

“Knowing may not make it better, Stark...”

“With all due respect, Mr. Fury, Sir, I think...I think that should be my decision, shouldn’t it?” Peter reached out to take Tony’s free hand and tug him back to the chair as he met Fury’s gaze with more bravado than he felt. “And I want to know. I need to know, Sir.”

Fury stared at the kid for a long time, his drawn expression relaxing into a grimace as he rolled his eye and shook his head. “Fine. Don’t say I didn’t warn you, though, Kid.

“You know your parents were Agents. Damn good ones, too. Mary Parker was the best scientist we had on board at the time. Hand picked by Howard Stark right out of college. We still use some of her inventions and her breakthroughs have saved more Agents’ lives than I can count. Richard...he was a field Agent and a damn fine one at that. Fearless. He ran into fights that would have terrified most. Honorable, too. He was a good man, just a ridiculously good man. If the Super Soldier program had continued beyond Cap, I have no doubt that Richard Parker would have been offered a dose. He was just that kind of guy.”

Peter felt Tony give his hand a squeeze. Through a veil of gathering tears, Peter glanced over at his boyfriend and could only blush over the intensity of emotion he saw in those deep brown eyes. “Wow, Pete, reminds me of someone...”

“Shut up,” Peter’s cheeks burst into an embarrassing flame of crimson as he tore his gaze away from Tony to once again focus on Fury. “Go on.”

“There was an incident at a lab in upstate New York. One owned by Oscorp.”

“Norman fucking Osborn...” Fury continued to speak over Tony’s angry growl.

“Anyway, we sent our best scientist. And where Mary Parker went, Richard followed. The event was...it was bad. Worse than we expected. Norman Osborn had been playing with dangerous forces. There was talk of Multi-Verses and gateways and the shit we saw in that lab...gave me nightmares for years. We tried to close the gateway but...we couldn’t and the stuff coming through was...it was bad. We tried to evacuate everyone before we sealed the place but Mary and Richard refused to leave until the very last minute because they thought they could still get the gateway to close.”

“You gotta understand, Kid, it’s not S.H.I.E.L.D.’s proudest moment. If I could have done anything I would have but I wasn’t in charge then and...they sealed the place with them inside.”

Peter didn’t move, didn’t breathe, just let the words reverberate inside his skull for the longest time. It was several long minutes before he finally felt Tony stroking the back of his hand and the meaning of Fury’s words finally settled into his conscious mind. “So...what you’re saying is that they could still be alive?”

Fury’s nostrils flared. “No, no that’s not...”

“But they could be. Best scientist in Shield and a top Agent and a gateway to a Multi-verse. They’re lost but they’re not dead. We just...we just have to find them. Tony...we just have to find them.” He snatched up Tony’s hand in both of his own, staring up at him hopefully. “Mr. Stark invented Time Travel to get me back from Thanos, so you can definitely invent Multi-dimensional travel to get back my parents, right? Right?”

Tony nodded slowly, bringing Peter’s hands to his lips to kiss. “Baby, I’d do anything for you, you know that. If you want to cross the Multi-Verse to find your parents, that’s what we’ll do...”

Peter was crying now, fat tears streaming for his eyes as he nodded repeatedly, utterly convinced that he and Tony were going to be able to do this. They’d accomplished much worse.

“You ever pay for those handcuffs you borrowed from S.H.I.E.L.D., Parker?”

Fury’s question brought Peter screeching back into the present with a choking gasp. He couldn’t possibly mean... “Wha...Bu...But you weren’t supposed to remember, Mr. Fury.”

“Funny thing about the Infinity Stones, I guess. They did a damn good job of erasing my memory in 1992, but when they brought me back after the Blip...they didn’t make sure those memories were still gone. I remember everything about you and the Boy Wonder. I’ve seen some pretty crazy shit in my time, too, so my only other question is for Stark. Just what the fuck are you? You’re not a Skrull. So what? Life Model Decoy? Clone? AI? Did Stark save his brain in a computer so he’d never die? One thing I know is you sure as hell aren’t his kid Stark.”

Tony just gave a nonchalant shrug, once more rising from his seat, hands now stuffed into his pockets as he paced the living room. “Oh, you’re right there. I’m Tony Stark but so was the Old Man. It’s complicated, Fury. And if you weren’t trying to distract us and change the subject, I’d take the time to explain it to you. But, since I can tell that Peter is a little too close to something you had no intentions of telling us...I think I’m just going to leave it at that and instead I’m going to ask you what they fuck you’re hiding. See...I know it’s not proof that the Parkers are dead. If it was, you’d produce it and that would be that. Peter would give up. You’d go home, we’d go back to our party...but you’re trying so hard to get us onto another subject that it has to be the opposite. You have proof that Mary and Richard Parker are alive and you don’t want us to know about it...but here’s the thing, Fury. I meant what I said to my sexy little spider. I’ll do anything for him. There’s no firewall, no encryption in this world strong enough to keep me out...not when I’ve set my mind on hacking it, not when I’m willing to create a whole damn AI whose sole job is to hack into ever piece of electronic intelligence in the god damn world and find me that one piece of information about the Parkers that you don’t want me to know. It’d be a lot easier if you just told me, Fury, but if you want me to do it the hard way I sure as fuck will...and I’ll do irreparable damage to your networks in the process.”

“Are you threatening me, Stark?”

“I mean, I thought I was being really fucking obvious about it but fine, you want me to spell it out for you, Fury. Tell us what you know about the Parkers, all of it, or I’ll make it my personal mission to destroy any alphabet agency you can dream up to replace S.H.I.E.L.D. now and for the rest of my young life because we’re the fucking heroes, the ones who save the god damn world day in and day out. Peter asks for nothing out of it. Nothing. All he wants is to know what happened to his parents and you fucking owe him that you one-eyed, self righteous, superhero wannabe. You knew the Old Man, so you know that I’m not bluffing. Spill it or get the fuck out of my house.”

Tony Stark had never looked so resplendently sexy to Peter a day in his life. The teenager really wanted to rip off that tuxedo and drag him into the bedroom to test their endurance for the rest of the night based on that speech alone, but his desires were quickly squelched by Nick Fury’s next words.

“We’ve been picking up a distress beacon emanating from the old Oscorp laboratory facility. We think it’s coming from the open gateway. It...appears to be Mary and Richard Parker...but they’re not radioing us for rescue, Stark. They’re radioing us to tells us to close the gateway...because something very bad is coming...”


	2. Chapter 2

“You have breakfast yet?” Tony eyed the six year old perched on a stool at his breakfast counter. Her responding expression was beyond her sparse years, little mouth drawn into a serious frown, brows furrowed, dark eyes humorless with their intensity. “Guess I should ask if you had anything good for breakfast, instead, right?” Without waiting for a response, he turned back to his cupboards, plucking two bowls, two spoons, a carton of milk and a box of cereal out before precariously balancing his bounty back across the kitchen to the counter.

Morgan immediately perked up at the sight of the sugary breakfast treat that Pepper tried very hard to keep away from her growing daughter. The fact that she had dumped Morgan on him this morning because she had an early morning conference call with someone in Japan just meant that Tony had a chance to spoil her, and spoil her he would. Tony couldn’t bring himself to look on her as a daughter no matter what genetics said about the matter, but he’d always wanted a little sister and Morgan Stark was special in every single sense of the word. He loved that kid and he’d happily murder anyone who even breathed on her wrong.

Morgan examined the box of cereal carefully as Tony prepared their meal, amused by the sugar-covered pieces of processed grain in the shape of tiny arc reactors and corresponding red and gold iron man helmet-shaped marshmallows. “Let’s not tell your mom about this, huh?”

Morgan cocked her head at him, providing him with a half smirk as she chewed.

“Yeah, okay, don’t know what that means. Kid, you’re the most cryptic six-year-old I’ve ever met.” He enjoyed a few spoonfuls of his own bowl before he thought to ask, “Happy’s taking you to school in a bit, right?” Pepper hadn’t said anything about Tony playing chauffeur, but he also hadn’t been paying much attention when the mother and daughter had arrived early that morning either. Pepper could count her lucky stars that he didn’t require a lot of sleep and that he was still almost obsessively focused on the puzzle that Fury had presented to him after the fundraiser or he’d likely have been down for the count like most of the civilized folk in Manhattan at that hour. As it was, he’d been deeply ensconced in his workshop with something that was going to benefit his future plans with Peter...a project he’d had to artfully hide from Pepper before she connected the dots and realized something he’d rather she not know. 

“Mhm,” Morgan barely afforded him a grunted response around her heaping mouthful of cereal. It really was a shame how Pepper fed this kid. Cutting sugar out of her breakfast food regimen was un-American. School plans settled, the two fell into a companionable silence, eating their cereal and glancing over the graphics of the Old Man on the box from time to time. Some kind of idle statistics about his do-gooding and IQ adorned the back. The IQ was off by twenty points. He was going to have to make them fix that. 

Tony didn’t realize Morgan had finished her cereal until he looked up from the box to find her staring at him with that same intense expression. “You okay, Maguna?”

“How come you and daddy are the same?”

Tony almost spit his cereal out. Somehow, he managed to swallow it in a gulp and stall for time with a little coffee as he coughed and sputtered on the soggy grain and milk. “Uh, well, it’s just genetics kid. You and the Old Man are a lot alike, too.”

“Um...no. You and daddy are just alike, TJ.”

“Okay...well...there’s an explanation for that...”

Morgan pursed her lips and raised both brows at him, moving to a kneeling position on the stool so she could lay across the counter and reach out to place her hands on his face. “You look just the same. And sound just the same. And your fingers are the same. You’re the same as my daddy.”

Yeah, okay, so she was a Stark and he really should have seen this coming. He could almost pity Howard in this moment if this gave him any clue about what he’d been like as a six year old. Christ. Tony cleared his throat, searching for something to say to explain it all away. Instead, all he could do was stall for time. “How did you figure this out, Kid?”

“Miss Friday helped me.”

“Seriously? What do you have to sat for yourself, Fri?”

“You told me to assist in Morgan’s education whenever possible, Boss.” Tony let out a long sigh, that had not been what he meant. “She asked me about your fingerprints and voice analysis and how they corresponded to Mr. Stark’s so I provided her with detailed comparisons of both.”

Tony tapped the back of the little girl’s hand on his cheek with his finger. “You think you’re pretty smart, don’t you?”

“Cause I am.”

“Mhm, and what made you think to compare my fingerprints and voice with your father’s?”

“My teacher said everybody has a voice that is just their own and not like anybody else in the whole wide world but you and daddy sound just alike. Sometimes when you put me to bed I close my eyes and pretend you’re him.”

God, she was actually trying to kill him, now. Tony felt his throat constrict as he plucked her hands off of his face and gave them a tight squeeze. “I’m not your daddy, Morgan. I wish I was because you’re so damn smart and beautiful and amazing, but I’m not. You’re right, though, I’m not you’re brother either. I just....I really need your mom and everyone else to believe that I am so can this be our little secret and I promise that sometime real soon I’ll sit down and tell you everything, okay? For now...believe me when I tell you that your daddy is out there watching everything you do and he’s so freaking proud of you kid. Whenever you see a rainbow or a shooting star or something crazy good happens to you out of the blue, that’s your dad telling you how much he loves you.”

“3000.”

Tony blinked away the tears in his eyes, clearing his throat and abandoning the counter to tidy up. “Exactly.”

“Boss, Happy is here to pick up Morgan for school...” Saved by the AI.

“You hear that, Maguna? Get a move on or you’ll be late. Wait...I want a hug first. Yep, that’s the stuff right there.” He buried his nose in the little girl’s hair for a moment and gave it a good ruffle with his fingers before he let go. “Be good and kick butt in school, okay? Love you, kid.”

“I love you too, TJ.”

“3000?”

A pause. “2005.”

“Ouch.”

~~~~~

“I’m still not sure about this.”

“What’s not to be sure about, Beautiful? I’ve thought of everything.”

Peter turned back to the holographic read outs with a long sigh. They were blueprints of the old Oscorp labs, or at least what little information Tony had been able to hack his way into at Shield, along with a few other reports that looked like weather and topographic readouts of the area. Peter knew that this was their best bet, but he didn’t like it. He didn’t think he could attribute it to his Spidey Sense, or Peter Tingle as the rest of the Avengers had taken to calling it (thanks to May). No, it didn’t feel quite the same. There was no sense of impending danger, just a heavy blanket of foreboding that was threatening to choke off his air supply. Tony obviously didn’t feel the same, so maybe he was just being silly. Or maybe he wasn’t.

Peter was supposed to tell May that he was going on a spring break trip with Tony, MJ, and Ned. While MJ and Ned were actually going to go to Florida to live it up, he and Tony were heading to upstate New York to infiltrate Osborn’s lab. Ned would be armed with a special Stark Phone that Tony had outfitted with the tech to provide realistic synthetic substitutes of Tony and Peter. If May or Pepper sent texts, they were going to get varied and believable responses meant to replicate the young men’s actual speech and text patterns. If they called or video chatted, a variant of the BARF technology was going to provide a realistic computerized response that would again fool the older women into thinking they were both in Florida living the good life by utilizing actual noise pollution and visuals from Ned and MJ’s vacation. The guilt of leaving May at the airport thinking they were taking Tony’s private jet to Florida when they were instead flying headfirst into danger...it was almost suffocating and he couldn’t ignore the worry any longer. “What happens if we’re not back in a week, Tony?”

“If we’re not back by the time that MJ and Ned have gotten back, than Friday is going to reveal our true destination to May, Pepper, and Fury so arrangements can be made.”

Funeral arrangements or just rescue mission arrangements? Peter wanted to ask, but he knew better than to say any of that out loud. He and Tony rarely fought, but Peter knew that nothing made Tony angrier than mentioning their own mortality. “Are you sure this is a good idea?” Because Peter wasn’t sure at all. He’d heard Tony’s argument a hundred times but part of him still felt sick at what they were planning to do.

“Your parents are out there. They’re alive. We don’t leave men behind. Besides, if there is something big and nasty coming than we need to know what it is and how to stop it. I refuse to do what the Avengers did and just sit around waiting for the Big Bad to come knocking down our door. We’re not going to be surprised again, Peter. Whatever this bad thing is...we’re going to identify it and even after we close that gateway...we’re going to be ready for it because there’s no guarantee that closing the gateway will end the danger. None.”

Peter could only nod slowly. “Yeah, okay. No, you’re right. Of course you are. I’m just...I’m nervous about getting my hopes up and visiting another world and just...everything.”

Tony laughed, reaching out to tug Peter across the room and into his arms. His lips ghosting against the younger man’s, breath hot against Peter’s mouth as he embraced him, “We had sex in two different times, Baby, now we get to consummate parallel earths. Tell me that’s not hot as fuck.”

“Depends on the parallel earths.”

Tony snorted a laugh as he nuzzled into Peter’s neck and nipped at his ear, “You need to stop worrying. We’re superheroes, Baby. Arguably the two best superheroes on the planet.”

“Only because Thor is off world with the Guardians...”

“Honestly, you and Thor. If I didn’t know better, I’d be jealous.”

Their conversation died off as the Quinjet came to a quiet landing. Peter held onto Tony for several more seconds, eyes closed, breathing in the scent of the older man in an attempt to calm the frenzied beating of his heart. Finally, though, he gently pushed himself away and tapped his watch to engage the Ironspider suit.

Several things became apparent to Peter as the two descended the ramp from the cloaked jet plane. This was clearly going to be even more difficult than Peter had thought. Fury hadn’t been lying when he said that Shield had sealed the lab in an attempt to prevent anything from the Gateway from breaching the outside world. From outward appearances, it looked like the entire building had been encased in a giant block of cement. “Uh, so...” 

“Don’t worry, I had the Iron Legion working on our way in for the last twenty-four hours. Believe it or not, inside this cement, there’s another layer of titanium. Anyway, it took six suits, but we have a way in. Follow me.” Iron Man circled the building with Spidey close on his heals. The moment they turned the corner, Peter could see the suits. It appeared that they’d concentrated their repulsers into a succession of laser-like beams that had sliced a rectangular chunk of cement and metal to reveal one of the doors on the blueprints. “I’m leaving them on guard duty while we’re gone. Friday will make sure that nothing comes out of this facility until we get back...and if by some miracle something gets by, she’ll radio the New Avengers. You don’t have to worry, Pete.”

“Famous last words.” It was in times like this that Peter found himself missing Mr. Stark. Tony just hadn’t experienced the level of failure and defeat that Mr. Stark, or even Peter, had. He didn’t know to expect the worst, but Peter did. He cast a wary glance at the Iron Legion, biting his tongue as Tony moved for the door.

It came open with a pop, the musty smell of stale air, dust and mildew washed out around them. Peter only got the smallest whiff before he felt the filtration system in the suit come online. 

The interior looked like nothing but darkness. No light could penetrate from the concrete and titanium covered walls, so there was nothing visible beyond a few feet into the entry. It wasn’t as if Mr. Stark hadn’t thought of those concerns a long time ago. Something as mundane as darkness was hardly any match for Iron Man. Lighting and night vision had been built into the earliest models of the suit, after all. As Iron Man stepped into the abyss beyond, that tech came online to illuminate the area around him and several feet in front of him. A similar array of artificial illumination ignited on the Ironspider suit as well. Gulping back his fear, Peter reached out to close the door behind them and they were bathed in black.

The entire facility was filthy, awash with dust, debris, and cobwebs. Out of the corner of his eye, Peter caught sight of what he could only assume was the corpse of a fallen Shield Agent, but he did his best to avoid looking at it for too long. Still, the momentary glimpse of the skeleton was burned onto is retinas. “Tony...”

There was something wrong with that sight. The body. As much as he wanted to avoid looking, he couldn’t help but glance back towards it. “Tony, if the building is sealed...how is that body not mummified...”

Tony was already bending over it to examine the bones as the oddity of the body struck him as wrong at almost the same time. “I think these are tooth marks...”. He held up an ulna, running an armored finger over the grooves on the bone. “These are definitely toothmarks. Friday says they appear...humanoid.”

Peter certainly hoped that Tony couldn’t hear him gulping in fear behind his own mask....but with the sensitive comms, he probably could. “Tony...what are we locked in here with?”

“I don’t know. Let’s just...be careful, and hope that Peter Tingle of yours is on point tonight.”

“Spidey sense.”

“Hmm,” Tony reverently replaced the bone and stood, brushing off his gauntlets. 

“I prefer the term ‘Spidey Sense.’ “

“Give me one good reason why I should call it Spidey Sense, Baby, because that name isn’t nearly as funny...”

“Because you’re the only thing that makes my peter tingle.”

Tony had to brace himself against the wall to support himself as he laughed. “God, Beautiful, every time I don’t think I could love you more...you go and drop one of those gems on me. Damn.”

Peter’s response was lost on his lips. He felt the telltale warning of danger shiver down his spine as he caught sight of movement just at the periphery of their location. There wasn’t time to warn him, there was really only time for Peter to fire a quick line of webbing at his lover and tug him back as something dark and terrifying lunged from the shadows. Peter could swear he could hear it moaning the word ‘meat.’ 

“What the fuck...” A repulser blast bit into the wall inches from the creature, scorching its arm and the tatters of what appeared to be clothing and once more driving it back into the shadows before either hero could get a good look at it. “Well, at least we know what ate the bodies...”

“Yeah, Tony, that’s not nearly as comforting as you think it is.” Even worse, perhaps, were the observations from both Karen and Friday that the creature had no heat signature and wouldn’t be visible on infrared. Now their trek through the building was much more careful and calculated. There were signs of the creatures everywhere. Claw marks on the walls, ransacked rooms, shattered furniture, the little skeletons of rats and mice and anything else unfortunate enough to have been sealed into the lab with them. It was only the knowledge of the Parkers’ distress call that kept Peter moving through the corpse of the once thriving laboratory. His parents were alive. They’d escaped this place, and so would he and Tony. They just had to.

At least Tony seemed to know where he was going. He’d studied the blueprints much longer than Peter and had no doubt pinpointed precisely where a lab with a dimensional gateway would be located. Neither man mentioned the occasional sound of shuffling footsteps, the soft grunts and moans, the momentary glimpses of shifting shadows. There were clearly more than one of those things in there with them, but for the moment, they were hanging back. Maybe Tony had scared them with the repulser. Or, maybe as with many of the hunters in the animal kingdom, they were stalking their prey and waiting for exactly the right moment to strike.

The Gateway didn’t look anything like Peter had imagined it would. Shows like Stargate had always made them out to be large and imposing, a shifting, whirling mass of colors housed within an intricate metal or stone structure that provided it shape. This portal was anything but. 

Peter could barely make it out without one of the specialized lenses of his suit. To the naked eye, it appeared as little more than the somewhat fluid appearance of very hot air on a humid July day. It was in that subtle wavering of the light that the slightest glimpse of a world beyond their own could be captured...but never long enough to make anything out. A quick sweep of the area showed that the portal was being maintained by a strip of metal along the ground that was joined to a large and imposing computer. While Peter had been examining the Portal, Tony had been taking stock of the technology.

“They cut off power to the lab in the hopes that it would cause the Gateway to close. It didn’t, which means that whatever is powering this portal isn’t coming from our dimension anymore.”

“That’s comforting.” Peter reached out to touch the shimmering air. As his finger hit the air, the tip of it vanished. He felt nothing. No pain, no tingling, no disconnection. Nothing to suggest it was a portal to another world besides the fact that the tip of his finger had vanished before his very eyes.

“Peter, stop poking the portal. It has a radiation signature...”

The young man withdrew his hand quickly, glad that Tony couldn’t see what he was certain was a guilty look on his face. Neither of the men had withdrawn their suits since entering the laboratory. The air inside the lab was breathable, if their read outs were any suggestion, but also so stale that it would likely not be pleasant for either one of them. Besides, with those monsters running around, it seemed smart to have some kind of protection on hand. Now, with what looked like a radiation signature emanating from the portal...the suits were staying on for the foreseeable future.

Tony was busy patching one of the main computer terminals into a handheld arc reactor to allow him to reboot and access the information they both hoped was still accessible on the hard drives while Peter was pacing the lab like a nervous animal in a zoo. Just like a nervous animal in a zoo, he could feel what was an indeterminate amount of eyes trained on his every movement and his inability to know where they were or what they were planning was making his every instinct scream warnings in his head.

Desperate for some distraction, Peter started to look more closely at the room itself. It looked as if the place had just been abandoned in the middle of a shift. There as a mug of coffee by one terminal with what appeared to be dried contents of a cup still housed within it. A stack of granola bars and food from what must have been a break room vending machine sat next to a swath of complicated equations that Peter picked up and shuffled through silently. Not everything was immaculate, however. A few desks had been upturned. Chairs broken. There were bullet holes in the wall near the door and the door itself had clearly been forced open from the outside by organic means.

“I think...I think after they sealed them in here, my mom and dad must have gathered some supplies and tried to stick it out in here. But um...whatever’s out there...it must have wanted them pretty bad.”

Tony glanced up from the computer, the expressionless mask of his armor giving Peter no hint as to what was going on in the mind beneath. 

Peter’s foot met with something on the floor and it skittered forward. Upon closer inspection, he recognized an old school camcorder with a tape still housed inside. “You um...you think you can make this work?”

Tony had already Jerry-rigged a thumb drive to the computers’ memory to download any and all information he could. Waving Peter over, he took the camcorder and in a matter of minutes had it once more powered up, tape rewound.

For several seconds it appeared to be a tape recording the team’s initial attempt to establish the Gateway. Then, the scene cut out and a familiar face came into frame.

She was a little older and much less put-together than she had been the last time that Tony and Peter had seen her, but there was no mistaking Mary Parker for all that she and Peter resembled one another. She was dirty, sweating, tired, but still very much alive as she addressed the camera.

_“If you’re seeing this, than that means you came back for us...which...all due respect, Fury, but that was stupid. I told you we’d be okay if you sealed us in here, that we’d figure something out...and we did. I think. I hope. No, I’m sure that we did.”_

_A loud sound shook the frame and with wide eyes Mary glanced off camera where Richard was shouting “Hurry up, Mary, we don’t have a lot of time here.”_

_“Right. Right. We can’t stay here, Fury. The anomalies are...they’re not like we thought. They appear to have higher brain function, an ability to communicate. They’ve displayed a remarkable ability to reason and hunt and now that they know they’re trapped in here with us...that we’re the only food supply left...they’re pretty determined to eat us. So uh....it’s time to go. And since we can’t get out of here through the door....we’re going to use the Gateway.”_

_“I’ve had a little bit of time to work on the math. I think I understand how this thing works at least as well as the men who built it...which arguably isn’t very well.” She held up the swath of complicated equations that Peter had seen on the desk nearby. “It’s all here. I’ll...leave if for you. Hopefully...hopefully it‘ll still be here for you.”_

_Another loud sound, a curse from Richard, and Mary paled considerably. “I’m sorry...I’m sorry I’ve got to cut this short. I...I can’t shut the Gateway down because it’s not being powered by our dimension anymore. Unless or until we find the power source, this thing is open for good...but I can change the world it opens up to. We’re not going to the world where these things originated...but beyond that. I don’t know. I’m going to try to make it home, Fury. But if we don’t...you keep your promise and you make sure my baby boy is taken care of, you hear me. You owe us that.”_

_The sound of wood splintering, of those creatures hissing and screaming and moaning. The camcorder dropped, still recording and slid against a desk, catching the image of Richard and Mary Parker as they ran through the Gateway to the screams of the monsters they left behind._

Peter closed the camcorder, hands trembling slightly. “Tony...if those things are as smart as she says...why aren’t they coming after us?”

Tony hazarded a glance towards the broken door and rubbed the back of his neck with a gauntlet. “I don’t know, Beautiful, but I don’t like it.”

Peter considered it for a moment. “Maybe they’re trying to get out again...”

“I don’t care how scary they are, Peter, there’s no way they’re getting past the Iron Legion.”

“So...when they can’t get out the door and they realize that we’re the only food source...”

Tony cursed, “Yeah. I think the ones we can hear are sentries...”

“They’re watching to make sure we can’t get away.”

“‘Fraid so. Or hoping that when we get done here we’ll leave them an opening to get out.”

Peter was already gathering the papers his mother had left behind, stuffing them into a briefcase he’d found discarded beneath a desk. He threw the camcorder in with it and after a moment’s hesitation grabbed the handful of granola bars as well. They probably didn’t go bad, right? And he might get hungry later. “What I don’t get...is why they didn’t go through the portal, too. If they’re smart and they’re hungry and they’ve been surviving in here for over a decade....why not try that other world out?”

“Because your mother was smart enough to leave it open to a location they wouldn’t be able to utilize, Pete. Radiation signature. Whatever is on the other side of that portal is deadly for them...at least as deadly as it would be for us.”

“But my parents...”

“They didn’t go through to that world, Pete.” Tony gestured to a read out near the floor where a long alphanumeric sequence could be seen. “You can see most of the readout on the video. It’s not the same. After your parents went through...they must have found a way to redial the Gateway and make sure it emptied to someplace...innocuous.”

Peter didn’t know if this new made him feel better or worse. “Okay...so...what’s our next move...” His words died on his lips, replaced by an anguished cry brought on by what felt like the pain of being set on fire. His Spidey-Sense had never felt like that before. It had never been so strong that it was excruciating, but as his gaze moved from Tony to the doorway and he caught sight of what had triggered the tingle...Peter completely understood.

His Spidey Sense was right. 

They were so totally and completely fucked.


End file.
